August 27, 2004

Only weblogs could have produced the whirlwind of argumentative and illuminating give-and-take, and camaraderie, that I’ve experienced the past two days, in a trialogue involving George Wallace of Declarations & Exclusions, Martin Grace of a tort et a travers (sounds like a dessert at Saratoga Racetrack), and myself. We even had email input from Overlawyered‘s overseer, Walter Olson, whose WLJ op/ed had inadvertantly fanned the fires.

I had never communicated with Martin Grace, but nevertheless felt compelled to inquire about his “studied ignorance” of the issues, while poking fun at his lack of a Comment section. Although I frankly expected Martin to be rather stuffy, he replied with humor and grace and his new posting led me to draft yet more Comments (by necessity at George’s weblog), which brought forth another effort by George [Regulating Regulators in the Name of De-Regulation] and ever more cogent, persuasive arguments from me. I was so inspired, in fact, that I coined a new term to describe the approach of certain partisan or ideologically-challenged pundits: FAFOFA — Falsely Accusing Foes Of False Accusations.

If you care about Med-Mal Insurance Reform, or presidential politics, or the need to repeal special-interest antitrust exemptions, I invite you to follow the threads. ( Indeed, I’d point you over there, even if I didn’t feel that I had the winning position on the law, facts, and politics.) But, I’m writing to say hurrah for weblog technology — with its mix of openness, ego, interaction, pings and pangs, it facilitated the meaningful exchange of ideas (perhaps opening and changing some minds) among actual human beings, who also happen to be lawyers and concerned citizens.

On the other hand, if you know the history of this website, you know that the last thing I’m supposed to be doing is getting all worked up and working intensely for long hours crafting arguments. So, I’m hoping George and Martin will either raise the flag of total surrender on these issues (fat chance!) or go on to new topics that I know or care little about [trust me, there are a lot of them in insurance law and policy]. I need a nap — without dreams of McCarran-Ferguson Act exemptions, please.

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